


the more it changes, the more it stays the same

by fallencrest



Category: Justified
Genre: Blow Jobs, Canon Compliant, Coal Mining, M/M, Near Death Experiences, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-09
Updated: 2014-06-09
Packaged: 2018-02-04 01:41:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,474
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1762089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fallencrest/pseuds/fallencrest
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There was something about Boyd, always had been, that made people listen when he spoke, as though there was something to every word of it. Raylan had noticed that pull himself a while back, tried not to let it act on him. Only Boyd had been acting on him since he was a six-year-old's phantom voice or a pair of green eyes spied through a door jam - it wasn't about to stop just because he'd noticed it. </p><p>Raylan never does learn to stop listening, never learns to look away.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the more it changes, the more it stays the same

The stupid thing is that Boyd Crowder has always been the north to his compass, a weighing anchor against which to define himself. Where-ever Raylan goes, he can feel the weight of it, the tug. He forgets it sometimes in Miami, at college, goes whole days without thinking about it. But those are only days, not weeks or months - he can't remember a time when he's gone that long without Boyd, without at least thinking about him.

He doesn't have to acknowledge it though, refuses to speak of it, fears making it real; until Boyd says, "Come on, Raylan, I know you can see it," as if dancing on the edge of the terrible and unspoken abyss, "the way it is between us." Boyd has these things he does with his hands, the kind of gestures that'd seem involuntary on anyone else but, on Boyd, they signal absolute control. "There's always been something between you and me, Raylan." 

It's the sort of taunt your subconscious goads you with in a dream, daring you to deny it. Only this is Boyd and this is real and Raylan should have a quip for this, a comment like "you mean our daddy's shared rap-sheets?" or "a mile and a half of pitted holler road?" 

There are honest answers, too, though, like "you mean, the way you sucked me off that last night, after the mine collapsed, when we were both nineteen and shaking and how I couldn't look you in the eye after - except then we both came back to Harlan and pretended it never happened - because I'd agree that's never gone away." But then he'd have to add, mocking and distancing, "You wanna talk about your feelings, Boyd?" 

Another honest answer is, "There'll be prison bars between us soon, if you keep going the way that y'are." But the truth of the thing is far more complicated than any of that.

 

The truth of the thing is:

Raylan is six years old and sat out on the front porch of Bo Crowder's house and he sees a dark-haired boy staring up at him from behind his daddy's car with big green eyes and no real expression Raylan can read. Neither of them says anything and he hears another boy yelling, "Boyd, Boyd, did you find the ball?" and the green-eyed boy doesn't say anything, just walks back behind the side of the house to the yard without looking up at Raylan again.

 

Raylan is nine and Boyd comes traipsing up the porch steps, wearing a pair of boots that look too big for him and a black eye worse than any Raylan has ever seen on a kid their age. 

"You alright there?" Raylan asks.

Boyd just shrugs a little, says "I am," and gets on with unlacing his boots. 

"You cause offense to someone?" Raylan asks, feeling impetuous and curious and thinking that's a nice way to say it, facing the question without reminding the boy he'd got beat up.

"I did. Someone who didn't know truth from a lie. But I guess he'll find out in the end." And Boyd pulls off his big old boots, lines them up just out the way of the door and says, all courtesy, "nice meeting you, Raylan," as he opens up the door and heads on inside. 

He thinks Boyd is the most serious boy he's ever met, almost like a grown-up already in those big boots and with that matter-of-fact way of speaking. He'd suspect that it had something to do with the way Bo Crowder treated his sons, only Bowman is loud and demanding and everything little kids are like and he's seen Bo send Bowman on his way with a pat on the head and a smile. So maybe it's a mystery but maybe it's just Boyd. 

 

Raylan is ten and Arlo has sent him to deliver a note to Bo and he's standing anxiously on the porch, arm twitching a little. Boyd answers the door and they're almost exactly the same height, they've never stood face-to-face like this before. "I'm meant to give this to your daddy," Raylan says, "can you go get him?"

Boyd says, "you can give it to me, it's alright," and Raylan isn't sure that he should, isn't sure that it is alright, but he hands it over anyway. He doesn't know if Bo ever gets the note or not but he guesses he must have, since Arlo never yells at him about it.

 

Raylan is thirteen and he's already keen on avoiding Arlo's business dealings but he sees Boyd surrounded by a gang of boys who are maybe listening to him or maybe figuring to beat on him and doesn't know whether he ought to be looking out for him. He figures not and, when he sees Boyd a couple of days later looking just fine, he knows he made the right call.

 

Raylan is fourteen and he sees Boyd coming out of a trailer at Audrey's and he tries to avert his eyes but doesn't manage to do so before he's noticed the difference in the way Boyd's carrying himself, tries not to think about it. 

 

Raylan is seventeen and he sees Boyd bothering Ava Crowder, cutest girl in the school and a sophomore. Ava meets Raylan's eye, as if asking him for a favour, and Raylan gets up and starts walking over before he spots Bowman. Bowman yells at Boyd, gets in real close to him and shoves him into the dirt. Raylan just watches whilst Bowman steers Ava away, getting all confidential with her as if he's promising he won't let his big brother bother her no more.

 

Raylan is nineteen and he's about to go down a mine for the first time in his life. He's milling around uncomfortably, helmet tucked under his arm, when Boyd says, "why, Raylan Givens, we meet again."

All Raylan can think is how he'd taken this job to get away from Arlo and all his people and that that category was certainly meant to include everyone by the name of Crowder. Instead of saying that though, he just says "Boyd" with a nod of the head, an awkward acknowledgement which he hopes will instate a certain distance between them.

"Raylan here," Boyd tells the small crowd of fellow miners around them, refusing to take the hint, "His daddy does a good deal of business with my daddy so we've long been familiar." 

There's something about Boyd, always has been, that makes people listen when he speaks, as though there's something to every word of it. Raylan's noticed it before, that pull, and he tries not to let it act on him. Only there's Boyd standing there and saying "Come here, Raylan," arms open wide so Raylan has no choice but to walk into them. And they hug, and Raylan realises he's never actually touched Boyd before, that Boyd has always been a sort of phantom presence - a voice in his father's house or a pair of eyes fixed on him from afar - never really physically material until now. 

Raylan's nineteen and he feels the pull of Boyd Crowder, the fascination, same as everyone else, and he finds himself saying "Good to see you, Boyd," and meaning it. 

Their chests bump awkwardly in the hug, they slap each other's backs as if attempting to keep things jocular, and they break away a little hastily, a little too soon.

Raylan follows Boyd Crowder down into the mine that first day and, on the last day, Boyd pulls him back out. 

Raylan follows Boyd Crowder down into the mine that first day and, between then and the mine collapse, they're friends.

They can be friends outside of the mine, so long as they are both still going back down there; they can drink together, smile, let their eyes meet for longer than they should, just so long as they are two miners and not two criminals' sons. Raylan doesn't even feel a need to run when they sit out together one night, drinking on a hill a way away from home, and Boyd keeps looking at him then closing his eyes just a second too long, as if he's waiting for Raylan to kiss him. Because they're nineteen and they're just two boys working a mine and they can be anything, anyone, just their imperfect selves.

But then, Raylan is nineteen and the darkness is closing in around him, and it's thick with black dust and all he can hear is Boyd's voice. He can feel Boyd grabbing his hand, pulling, tugging, yelling his name. 

And they lie coughing in the dusky light, coal-smothered, keeping their goggles on because they don't want to rub the dust in their eyes. And Raylan feels more alive than he ever has and less in control of anything and they lie there for a full half hour, not saying anything after that first "you alright, Raylan?" 

"'M fine. You?"

"I'm fine, Raylan," and Raylan thinks then about how Boyd seems to like to say his name, every chance he gets, as though he's reminding Raylan of who he is, who they both are; only then Raylan goes back to thinking _holy shit, we're alive_. 

Next thing they do is to stumble to the restroom in the mining office, pull off their gear, hemlets, goggles, gloves and try to wash the coal from their hands and faces - only it's still everywhere, still on everything, and it doesn't really work. Boyd asks if he's alright again and Raylan says he is, even though he isn't. It's too bright in the restroom, he thinks, and Boyd Crowder just saved his life, probably.

He tries to leave the restroom but Boyd's in the way so he winds up cornering him against the door-frame, staring for too long before he pushes the door open, stumbles back out into the dark. 

Boyd follows him out. He's still disorientated, but they agree stumblingly that they shouldn't be going anywhere alone right now, so Raylan winds up driving Boyd's old car down the mountain a few minutes later, he's going far too fast so Boyd makes him pull over, saying his name again, and Raylan's hands are shaking when he takes them off the wheel. 

Boyd takes the keys out of the ignition, leaning in close, across him, and Raylan says, "I'm not going down a mine again. Not ever."

"Yeah?" Boyd asks, like it's a question, and he's still leaning across the seat and he puts his hand on Raylan's thigh. 

It's dark in the car, with the engine off and the lights down. 

Raylan doesn't say anything when Boyd unbuttons his jeans and moves his hand up in there, palming him, moving the cloth aside and then bending in even closer. Raylan doesn't do anything to stop him, to encourage him, just tips his head back and closes his eyes and wonders if he ought to do something. He could push Boyd off him or try to but he doesn't really want to and Boyd's hand on his cock feels good in the way that feeling alive does. Raylan gasps, just about manages to say "Boyd", when he feels the first brush of Boyd's lips on his cock and Boyd just opens his mouth, pressing his tongue to Raylan's erection. 

When he's done, they sit in silence again for a moment before Boyd says "I think I should drive you home, Raylan."

Raylan shrugs, feeling a million miles away from himself, and then he gets out of the car, walks unsteadily around to the other side whilst Boyd shuffles across into the driver's seat. 

Once he's in the car again, door clicked shut behind him, Raylan says "I'm leaving Kentucky," and the way he says it is almost vindictive in a quiet sort of way.

Boyd starts the engine as he says, "I know," and Raylan would question how Boyd knew, if it weren't for the fact he's been talking about leaving since that first day down the mine. Mining was just how he was fixing to make the money to break out of Harlan.

"I don't know what you want from me," Raylan says, "but-"

"I don't want anything from you, Raylan, except that you let me drive you home." Boyd's voice is cool and calm and as though five minutes before he hadn't had Raylan's cock in his mouth, as though an hour ago he hadn't saved Raylan's life. 

He drives Raylan home and, when Raylan gets out of the car, he says "goodbye, Raylan," as though he knows it will be years before they see each other again.

Raylan doesn't say anything, because he's nineteen and he almost died tonight, but he does turn back to take one last look at Boyd, illuminated unevenly by the headlights, and he doesn't realise then that he won't see Boyd again for twenty years or how he'll be unable to forget him. 

 

Because, the truth of the thing is:

Raylan is nineteen and he gets aunt Helen to give him a lift up to the mine so he can pick up his car and his heart is racing a little because he thinks he might see Boyd.

Raylan is nineteen and he meets a boy at orientation with dark hair and green eyes and he wants to sleep with him until he speaks and his accent is all wrong.

Raylan is twenty-one and the guy he's been sleeping with makes a quip about how it must have been hard growing up queer in Kentucky and Raylan says, "it wasn't so bad," and thinks that it's not as though he'd ever gone for guys growing up, 'cept the perennial and constant temptation of Boyd Crowder. And, even then, he thinks, it'd taken him until Boyd had blown him for him to really know what was going on there.

Raylan is twenty-four and Helen writes in his birthday card that Boyd Crowder's back in Harlan and it bothers him more that Helen thought to mention it than that Boyd's back home again.

Raylan is twenty-seven and he meets the most beautiful woman he's ever seen, only he doesn't notice how beautiful she is until she speaks and she sounds like Kentucky and somehow then she becomes everything he's ever wanted. Raylan is twenty-nine and he marries her. 

Raylan is forty and he shoots Tommy Bucks and he's back in Kentucky and then in Harlan and Ava's married a Crowder (but Bowman, of course it's Bowman, not Boyd, he should have known that) and she's killed him. And Raylan tries not to let his eyes go wide when Art shows him Boyd's rap sheet. 

Raylan is forty and suddenly there Boyd is again. Raylan is forty and he still hasn't learnt to look away.


End file.
